Gracing the cover of the latest issue of Vogue, Golden Globe winner Amy Adams took part in an eccentric photoshoot that had her dressed up as characters in fairy tales. On the cover, Adams wore a sheer black dress with leaf-patterned detail and her red hair swept to the side, but the American Hustle star also donned costumes for her fantasy-inspired fashion spread within the magazine’s pages.

One photo portrays Adams as an ice princess on top of a snowy mountain, while another photo shows her as a ballerina puppet being manipulated by director Tim Burton. Her latest film project, Big Eyes, was directed by Burton, who raved in the Vogue interview about what a nuanced actor Adams was. “She brought something so subtle to this; I am not used to dealing in subtlety. It almost felt like a silent movie sometimes,” said Burton.

Amy Adams Lands First Vogue Cover http://t.co/RAdzJUNbT6 (via @FishbowlNY) pic.twitter.com/dc3ca2FP5N

— Mediabistro (@Mediabistro) November 17, 2014

Amy Adams is on the cover of #Vogue and these fairytale images with Tim Burton are amazing http://t.co/SBGPREw9f6 pic.twitter.com/NLRliXC9Ex

— JustJared.com (@JustJared) November 17, 2014

Amy Adams is a snow queen in magical shoot for Vogue http://t.co/asX57190cP pic.twitter.com/qhRKjg9x8P

— Daily Mail Femail (@Femail) November 18, 2014

Adams also revealed in the interview that she didn’t always find it easy to be an actor. She said that she was a “mess” during the first few years she tried to make it in Los Angeles. “I was able to do everything from day player to guest star to small parts in movies,” she said. “I felt a lot of pressure, but I just wasn’t able to get there in the audition room. Or even in meetings. My squirreliness would come out, and people wouldn’t feel confident. I’ve always been someone who had, like, a spirit of perseverance, but I actually almost quit because I was starting not to like who I was.”

Although Adams has had a prolific and successful career since her early days, she confessed that it didn’t prevent her from having a meltdown when she turned 40 in August of this year. “I was like, ‘I’m 40 and I still care what people think of me; I still don’t do laundry so I’m always out of things; I’m just not a grown-up at all,’ and I had this expectation that I would be by this age,” Adams said.